'It's motivated movement'

Published 7:00 am, Thursday, September 26, 2013

In his low-key way, and with audible traces of his native East Tennessee, Johnny Pickett tells remarkable stories of his years with Flying by Foy.

“For more than 10 years, I’ve been traveling around the world making people fly,” Pickett said in a recent interview while he was in Midland helping prepare the flying sequences for “Dracula, the Musical,” opening this weekend at the Midland Center for the Arts.

The “flying director” for the show, Pickett spent several days preparing the equipment and training actors and crew at the Midland Center for the Arts in the fine art of theatrical flying.

“You really work to try to create this cocoon of safety” so that the actors can focus on their characters, he said.

He also works with the actors not only on the logistics but their characters’ motivation.

“It’s truly an art form … It’s motivated movement, it tells a story,” he said.

Pickett has worked with Center Stage Theatre on several shows, most recently “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” last fall.

While he was here for “Wonka,” Center Stage Production Manager Kristen O’Connor asked him to take a look at the Little Theatre with the idea of including flying scenes in “Dracula.” Flying had only been done in the center’s Auditorium.

“I looked it over,” Pickett said. “I said, ‘Yeah, it’s possible.’” He noted that while the Little Theatre stage is considerably narrower than the one in the Auditorium, the vertical space is much higher.

Design, installation and planning were “almost a year-long process,” he added.

Pickett said O’Connor’s set design, with “peek-a-boo windows,” provides “all these great little vignette spaces.”

Some of the actors will not only have the option of going “stage left” or “stage right,” but also “stage up,” O’Connor said.

Pickett has worked on some very high-profile assignments, including flying members of the Black-Eyed Peas during Super Bowl XLV in 2011 and Jennifer Lopez on “American Idol.” He also has worked with Britney Spears, Flavor Flav and Hank Azaria, among many others.

“I’m constantly doing a mix of community theatre, TV and other things,” he said. “I probably have more fun in these kinds of shows.”

Many actors and other performers experience a fear of the unknown when faced with a flying role. Pickett helps them to learn the body position that will work best and provides orientation, discussing their concerns and questions.

“I earn their confidence,” he said.

He noted that MCFTA is “always ambitious” in their shows.

“There’s no exception with the flying,” he said.

Peter Foy, founder of Flying by Foy, established his credentials with one of the most famous flying stars of Broadway in the 1950s - Mary Martin in “Peter Pan.” From that beginning, his company became “the world leader in theatrical flying effects,” Pickett said.

Pickett was working with the Siegfried & Roy show in Las Vegas when he started working part-time for Foy 14 years ago.

“I coiled cables, put away parts … They’d call me when they needed a second guy on a big show,” he said.

He worked with Foy with greater and greater frequency and took a job with the company the third time they offered one.

One of Peter Foy’s goals was “to try to make flying accessible to everybody … make it affordable for schools and community theater,” Pickett said.

“The kid we fly today is the director that hires us to fly in 15-20 years,” he said.